


Sleeping Sickness

by lovelykenobi



Category: Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Borderline!Anakin, Everybody Lives, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multi, This is Anakin centric (as usual), also i really wanted to work with
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-14
Updated: 2016-06-14
Packaged: 2018-07-15 03:40:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7205711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovelykenobi/pseuds/lovelykenobi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the universe where Anakin never goes Dark Side, he has constant nightmares of the universe where he does, and loses everything he cares about. He finds solace in those he loves, who help him cope.<br/>"Padmé knew Anakin had been getting worse. He had been distancing himself, spending most of his free time working away on a new feature for Artoo or fixing something that really didn’t need fixing. The nightmares were draining him: there was no longer the same sparkle in his eyes."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sleeping Sickness

**Author's Note:**

> While writing this I listened to ["Sleeping Sickness" by City and Colour ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFjqQh7TSTo)and ["Don't Swallow the Cap" by the National.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFnA-8H-5lo>) I'd also recommend [this playlist.](http://8tracks.com/mrxsm/careful-fear-dead-devotion) I hope you enjoy reading!

"Everything I love is on the table,  
Everything I love is out to sea,  
I'm not alone,  
I'll never be."  
-The National, "Don't Swallow the Cap"

Despite all the time that had passed since the war, Anakin still succumbed to the nightmares. He woke up in a cold sweat and a searing pain in his heart, a sour combination of fear and anger clouding his senses.

The dreams had lessened with distance from the Republic: they were no longer every night, but they were weekly, sometimes more. But they had been getting worse with every passing day, visions of blood and death and destruction. And they felt just as real as the ones about his mother. He knew he had no power over them, but his hands shook and his skin went ice-cold because if they were to come true, he could never protect them. He had no power to protect his family.

And it terrified him. He, the so called Chosen One, was petrified. The nightmares of fire and damnation, of the end of the universe, of Padmé’s death and Obi-Wan’s. He dreamt always of being alone in the universe, of losing everything he loved and having no power against it.

He would wake up with a gasp of air and the empty feeling of having blood on his hands. He felt powerless and isolated, despite having his two lovers beside him.

It became a routine of his, when he woke up on those nights, to crawl out from under the sheets and intertwined limbs. Carefully, to avoid waking them, he’d get a glass of water, and put his robe on. Then he’d sit on the balcony, overlooking the landscape below.

It was a false sense of peace. He knew that when he closed his eyes the dreams would come again, and he’d have to see the blank look of dead eyes belonging to those he loved. Anakin wrapped the fabric tighter around himself, pretending he was swallowed by the sea, sinking lower and lower but not drowning. There, he would be no danger to anyone.

When asked where he’d gone, Anakin dismissed it, saying he didn’t want to talk about it. And the subject was generally left to Obi-Wan and Padmé putting the pieces together on their own, and choosing to give him space until he was ready.

But tonight was different. It was a new dream, and it was gruesome and vile. There were shattered screams and an impending sense of danger on a planet made of fire. In such an awful place, Padmé lay on the ground, limp and cold with death. Her face was streaked with tears, a mark of some kind of broken promise.

Obi-Wan had also been struck down. A lightsaber impaled through his chest, leaving a gaping hole in his robes. And Anakin looked upon the destruction, knowing nothing but that it was his fault.

And Anakin burned, abandoned and alone in a volcanic atmosphere. The pain was unbearable, feeling himself disintegrate. No one came for him, and that was where he died, in agony and emptiness.

When he awoke, the room around him was blurred by tears. The dream had felt so real, as if he had lived such a fate in another life, and he felt like he was collapsing. The reminder that his lovers were still alive was not enough to steady him. Darkness consumed him.

He slipped out from the room, quiet and careful. They wouldn’t understand. Anakin told himself that it was his fight and his fight alone.

Once in the hallway, he covered his mouth to muffle the sobs, and sank down to the ground. Every breath was heaving. So afraid, so afraid of losing everything. Weak and powerless against the forces that he couldn’t control.

Either they would die because of him, or they would leave because of him. His life was bound to collapse around him. Natural disasters leave nothing behind; you’re a tornado, a hurricane, a tsunami. You destroy everything you touch.

He steadied himself and walked into the kitchen, filling himself a glass of water. The house seemed so dark and empty, even with the children and his spouses only feet away.

He felt as if he was drifting out to sea. Everyone he knew on shore was calling out to him, and even if he wanted to return, his arms just kept rowing, pushing himself further and further away. There was no end in sight.

Padmé knew Anakin had been getting worse. He had been distancing himself, spending most of his free time working away on a new feature for Artoo or fixing something that really didn’t need fixing. The nightmares were draining him: there was no longer the same sparkle in his eyes.

Underneath the dead shell of a person was the man she had fallen in love with-- she had seen him get bad before, after his mother died. He had bottled it all up and buried it deep inside him and she knew underneath there that he was screaming, tortured by such violent isolation.

Obi-Wan knew it, too. He felt it in his husband’s Force signature-- it was darker, colder. Most always his Force signature felt yellow-orange, and when he got bad again, it was blood-red and purple like a bruise. Among that, Anakin was quiet and brooding -- he never slept well, but he slept so little during those times.

They were worried about him. He distanced himself and walled himself off, making him practically impossible to reach. Anakin was only reachable during those times through warm feelings sent through the Force and gentle gestures-- even then, he was still absent.

Obi-Wan woke up as grief pushed through the Force, and he knew it was Anakin. Sometime he reached out for help without awareness of it, calling to Obi-Wan through his blankets of isolation.

Taking a deep breath, he woke up Padmé with a soft kiss to the forehead and a quiet “Anakin needs us.”

Anakin was curled up on one of the couches on the porch, staring blankly across the green landscape. He looked so small underneath his robe, incredibly fragile.  
“Hi.” He said, not turning around to meet Obi-Wan’s eyes.

“Hello.” He said. “Is it okay if I sit next to you?”

Anakin nodded, sniffling. Obi-Wan joined him on the couch, and Anakin shifted his position so that his weight leaned against him. Obi-Wan took his hands, and they were shaking violently.

“Hey. _Hey._ ” Obi Wan said, cupping the side of Anakin’s face. “You’re okay. I promise. You’re safe now.” He had started to sob again, pressing his face into Obi-Wan’s shoulder.

Padmé, now roused from sleep, came out the door. The two moved to make space on the couch to accommodate her, and she took a spot next to Anakin. When she sat down, she kissed the crown of his head.

“Ani, whatever you saw. I promise it’s not real. We’re real. We’re real and we’re here.” She ran her fingers gently through his tangled hair as she spoke.

“I won’t let anything hurt you, and Padmé and I are both safe. We’re not going anywhere.”

Anakin wiped tears out of his eyes. “I’m sorry for waking you. I was just so scared and --”

“Hey.” Padmé interrupted. “You don’t ever have to apologize for waking us when you need something.”

“Can you tell us what happened?”

Anakin nodded, taking a deep breath before continuing. “You were both dead and it was my fault. And I died and I was all alone in the universe without you.” He sobbed harder, taking gasping breaths.

“Oh God, Ani. I’m so sorry.”

Upon hearing her words, Anakin closed his eyes and cried into Obi-Wan’s chest, said little but stroked his hair, trying to calm him down. “It’s okay, shh, it’s okay. It’s not real. It wasn’t real.”

“Sometimes I feel as if I’m a danger to the two of you, and to Luke and Leia. Like there’s a dormant part of me that’s a monster, that could one day come alive and destroy everything. I see it in my dreams.”

Obi-Wan held his chin and stared into his eyes. “Do you remember what I told you?”

“You told me that I have the power to control everything that happens in my life, and that my dreams never dictate me.”

But _God,_ did Anakin feel powerless. Despite every reassurance, he felt as if he had no control over his fate. In his dreams, he watched upon destruction with no say in it, no control over the situation.

He was so afraid of being powerless. When he was a child, he was powerless, slave with no say. When his mother died, he was powerless. And now, even if he was free-- he still felt powerless.

“Do you believe that?”

“I try to. But I don’t.”

“Why not?”

“I’ve never been able to change my fate before.”

“Anakin. You left the Jedi order - _we_ left the Jedi order, and Padmé left the Senate, to raise our children together. We left everything behind to start a family together, and you think we can’t change our fate?”

Anakin bowed his head. He didn’t want to admit that Obi-Wan was right, because the nightmares took such precedence over the truths of real life.  
“Look around you. All of this? This is changing our fate.”

As the two spoke, Padmé ran her fingers through Anakin’s hair, putting little braids into it as he liked-- the sensation slowed his heart and racing mind.  
“I promise you that you are in control. And I promise you that you could never hurt any of us, and we are all safe.” It was true. Anakin was safe and so was his family-- they were far away from harm.

“We love you, Ani.”

Obi-Wan squeezed his hand. “What do you need from us?”

“I just want to go back to bed.”

“Then let’s go back to bed, and in the morning we’ll go get breakfast with the kids, okay?”

Anakin smiled faintly. He was exhausted. The dream had felt so real, but what surrounded him was all the more-- the love that filled their house, and laughter and joy: that always prevailed over the darkness inside of him. It would continue to.

The three returned into their room holding hands, and Anakin fell back asleep in a shower of kisses and two pairs of arms wrapped around him. He was safe, and he could fight back against the darkness inside him.

_Every star in the galaxy was a constant beacon of hope, every planet and every person. Anakin had a habit of forgetting that he would never be alone, not on any world or in any universe._

On the left side of the bed, was the man who had followed him halfway across the galaxy and given up everything for him and Padmé, leaving behind the Jedi Order and everything he’d ever known. He’d never regret that decision, because he was happier than he’d ever been. Obi-Wan had an undying devotion for the home and family he’d created with his lovers, never knowing how fufilling a life away from the Jedi could be.

On the right side of the bed was the woman who had seen every ugly part of him and still stayed. The angry parts, the unforgiving parts, the deceiving and lying parts. She saw Anakin as human despite every mistake. Despite every fear Anakin had of her leaving, she never would.  
Everything around him was forever. He was loved, and he was never alone, even in the dead of night.

**Author's Note:**

> Here's another one-shot ObiAniDala for the "nobody dies" AU because the last one got such positive reviews! I hope you guys enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it. I really love the ObiAniDala dynamic and Borderline!Anakin, which I've been wanting to work with for a while.  
> Thank you so much for reading! Please leave kudos or a comment if you enjoyed, it means the world to me!  
> All the love,  
> K.C - lovelykenobi


End file.
